Resuming my previous post on Berg and Bass' Conformity and Deviation, I will now go over some of the problems of conformity and deviation and highlight the importance of them being used relative to the situation at hand.
There are certain questions that should be raised in dealing with problems of conformity and deviation. "An item of behavior, taken in and by itself, cannot be labeled either conformity or deviation. There is no such thing as conforming and deviating behavior in the abstract" ( p.159). That means that terms "conformity" and "deviation" only make sense in relative to certain scenarios, such as when the following questions are raised:
1. Conformity to what? Deviation or departure from what? Conformity is always conforming to something while deviation is always departure from something, whether the referent of that "something" is made explicit or not. What is that 'something'? The referents may be the prevailing, usual, or expected ways of doing things in the individual's surroundings. This is the normative basis of the problem. The referents may be the individual's particular place of position in the scheme of interpersonal or group relationships. This is the organizational basis of the problem. Does the individual accept and behave in term of the place and position expected of him and his kind in the scheme of things?
2. What is the relative importance of the behavior area in which conformity and deviance occur? For example, is it a matter of whether a father takes care of his family as he should, or is it a question of whether he keeps up with the baseball scores in the World Series as his friends do?
3. Is the normative basis of the behavior shared and upheld by other groups to which the individual is related in some capacity? Or do his or her multiple groups put contradictory or even conflicting demands and expectations on the individual for his or her behavior in given dimensions? This, of course, relates to the problem of integration or conflict of social values in the psychological world of the individual.
4. Does conformity or deviation occur through coercion or threat of subsequent coercion and force, or is the behavior in question prompted by the individual's inner convictions and personally cherished values?
5. What are the alternatives available for the individual in the stimulus situation with respect to the area of behavior in question? Are they clearly defined or difficult to distinguish? In other words, what situational factors enter into the picture, both as to the physical setting and the other people involved?
When studied in the context of these questions, conforming or nonconforming behavior can be taken as
an index of the degree of stability or the extent of change in the human relations of a given setting and specifies whether change occurs primarily through coercion or through the voluntary interaction of individuals (p.161).
Thus viewed, conforming and nonconforming behaviors can serve as a basis for evaluating the trends in human relationships: how a group is doing and in what direction it is headed.
Taking a stand as an apologist of conformity could amount to the praise of blind subservience. Conversely, singing the praise of nonconformity, apart from the evaluation of the norm value to which it is related, may make conformity seem righteous. As a result, nonconformity or conformity cannot be evaluated in its own right apart from its referent, namely the normative basis of the behavior in question.
The representative problems of conformity and nonconformity can be more effectively singled out through due recognition of man's behavior relative to significant other persons. This is because conforming or nonconforming behavior makes very little sense when it is not analyzed within a framework of these relationships.
An observation will illustrate this point. Bass cites a 1958 study in which a group of liberal students in the southwest was interested in persuading shopkeepers to cater to Negro students. The response of the shopkeepers was that they were willing to do so but each individual was concerned about what the other shopkeepers in the area would do. From this, he states that,
Our image of ourselves, our appraisals of our own practices, are not self-generating. They are not independent or our relatedness to people significant in our eyes, whether these significant people are seen as friend or foe (p.174).
If the problem of conformity and independence is formulated within a framework of the individual's group's setting, we are confronted with relationships in which the problem is an ever-present, integral aspect of interaction situations and not an incidental issue. If the problem is formulated within the concreteness of group relations, as these relations unfold in the actualities of social life, then conformity and nonconformity acquire a functional significance which loses meaning apart from these relations. When man enters into repeated interaction with others, directed toward similar concerns and goals, he takes part in a process of norm formation and stabilization.
Furthermore, issues are not necessarily in a dichotomous form, that are either for the individual or for the group; it depends on the specific scenario. "Within the framework of man's ties with other men in lasting relationships, the conflicting or harmonious character of interests is itself a problem of study. With the vantage point, thus gained, the external stimulus can be studied as it becomes relevant to relationships among individuals facing definable problem situations" (p.175).
To summarize, "in all phases of his daily living- social, political, economic, etc.- man is confronted today with pressures to regulate his behavior within advocated mold and directions"(p.193). An item of behavior, whether in social, political, or economic spheres, cannot be characterized by itself either conforming or deviating. It is always conformity or deviation relative to some premise, canon, standard, or value- in short. to some norm. Finally, since social value, moral standards, or norms are products of interactions between human beings over a period of time, issues of conformity and nonconformity must be analyzed in such a context.
This concludes my literature review series on Conformity and Deviation by Berg and Bass. I will continue future posts by analyzing more modern psychological studies that I can relate to my senior project.
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